Learning About Government

In September the kids in Mrs. Melton & Mrs. Hanfland's classes were learning about the Government and Mayor Allegood spoke to the classes about the Bill of Rights & Constitution.  It was a  lively question & answer session with the children asking some very interesting and thoughtful questions.  

Mayor Allegood was so impressed, he asked the kids to come and speak to the Board of Aldermen at a City Meeting.   Accompanied by Mrs. Hanfland, Mrs. Curran, the principal of Acworth Intermediate School and Mrs. Bagley, the 4th & 5th Grade Guidance Counselor, a handful of students from the classes got a chance to ask their questions in front of the Mayor, Aldermen and a large group of citizens.

Congratulations to Peter, Jacob, Danielle & Kianna from Mrs. Hanfland's Class and Emma, Jon, Kyle & Kaitlyn from Mrs. Melton's Class.  You all did a great job!  There were some well thought out questions ranging from "What does the Mayor do?" to "What can the city do about the smell from the sewage treatment plant?"

getting ready to go into the meeting

Mayor Allegood & Principal Curran

Mayor Allegood, Mrs. Curran, Mrs. Bagley & Mrs. Hanfland

Emma asking her question!  I was so proud of her speaking up!

well deserved applause from the audience!

congratulations from the Mayor on a job well done!

Halloween Fun!

Yesterday was full of fun and fantasy.  After a quick trip to the store for 2 blocks of dry ice,  I had the opportunity to spend the day with Emma at school helping her teacher with science activities with a halloween theme.

The first experiment was to see if you could blow up a balloon with just a piece of dry ice in a test tube.   Yes it does, and the longer you wait the bigger it gets!

The favorite of the kids was to put some dry ice & a little water in a cup and put an airtight lid on it, and watch what happened...  (note all participants were wearing safety glasses!)

Emma did not have a halloween shirt and made her own, our little fashion designer.  She took a sheet of labels and drew on it and then pinned it on securely.

trapped CO2 caused a bit of a bang!

the lids deformed right before flying off, sometimes whole, sometimes in pieces!  The kids were a bit sad that we ran out of lids.

Another experiment was to have the dry ice blow a bubble, it looks so cool, but was even more fun in person watching the gasses swirl inside the bubble soap.

if you got too much bubble soap in the dish with the dry ice it made "brain bubbles" that would pop in a puff of "smoke"

Sometimes it would bubble and burst like a swamp in a science fiction movie.

The experiment Mrs. Melton & I were not so fond of, touch a metal object to the piece of dry ice and listen, it was far worse than fingernails on chalkboards!  Thankfully, paperclips freeze fast!

We had to have a snack befitting the day...  Smoking Pond Scum Punch served from a scary bowl

And cake (yes it was wonderfully good!) that kinda both grossed and excited the kids!

After school it was time to get dressed in her costume and go trick-or-treating.  Emma designed her costume this year.  She found a pair of black & blue fairy wings and made a tutu to go with them, added combat boots, fishnets and a top and shorts from dance class and you had a "dark fairy".  I helped with hair and makeup to complete the transformation.

She had a great time with her friends and thankfully shared the loot!  While editing the images, Emma wanted to do some herself, so this is her contribution to the images.  A "glamour" version! I need to train her some more so she can help edit images for us!

Happy Birthday

We celebrated Georgia Birth Network's (GBN) 4th Birthday today with a picnic at Red Top Mountain State Park. We had such fun with everyone. It was great to meet some new people and to catch up with some old friends.

As usual I had my camera with me and captured the events of the day. Though it was warm and humid everyone had a great time. Thanks to all that came out and all that donated door prizes. We had a lot of prizes and lots of FREEBIES for all.

Emma helped out by donating some prizes for the kids and doing a lot of face painting, she had fun and was really excited to see some of her friends.

Here are some of my favorite pictures!  Including the cake (before it melted! which I did not get a picture of)

The rest of the images are in the slideshow below (click the image to start it playing!)

The images in the slideshow are also in a gallery at www.pictage.com/520440.  I hope everyone had a great time! I can't wait for next year!

Ouch!

Not having a studio makes it easier for my clients to be comfortable in their own environment and not have to lug the kids across town. So I drive a LOT and have a "zippy" little tealish green Honda CRV that I dearly love!  I've even discussed with Mike getting it image wrapped or painted with my trademark polkadots :) 

Well I may be closer to that thanks to my afternoon yesterday... while headed to a session and stopped at the light "zippy" was hit from behind and had her back bumper "re-designed".

Here's a close up of the dented bumper and wheel well

Thankfully she is still drivable and the gear in the back was not damaged.  I did hurt my back and knee and will be moving slowly for a while but no major damage.  Now to deal with getting things fixed and dealing with the insurance companies.